When Working Means Deadly Risk, Backlash Brews: ‘I Was Like, No’

On March 28, Chris Smalls felt like giving up. He’d spent days talking with co-workers at the Amazon.com Inc. warehouse in New York City’s Staten Island about how to temporarily shut down the facility, where many say management has been slow to disclose and address cases of Covid-19. They’d tried approaching managers with their concerns as a group, to no avail, he says. That morning, a Saturday, Amazon management told Smalls they were directing him to self-quarantine because of contact with a co-worker who’d tested positive, a move Smalls says was arbitrary and designed to shut him up.

For a ...